Chương 4
His face tightened.
“What?” Claire asked.
He hesitated.
“Read it.”
He turned the card so she could see.
The typed heading said:
SOPHIE RESET PROCEDURE.
Below it were instructions.
No devices.
No visitors except approved family.
Thirty-minute minimum quiet period after disruptive behavior.
Extend period if crying continues.
Meals may be delayed until calm compliance.
Mobility aid to remain outside room unless medically required.
Claire read the last line twice.
The letters did not change.
She heard Sophie shift behind her.
Claire stepped sideways to block the card.
Too late.
“What does mobility aid mean?” Sophie asked.
Claire looked at Reyes.
His face said he hated the answer too.
“Your crutch,” Claire said.
Sophie stared at the floor.
“Oh.”
Claire knelt.
The black rubber tip of the crutch rested inches from her knee.
“Listen to me.”
Sophie’s eyes were shiny but dry.
“You don’t have to be calm for me.”
Sophie looked confused.
“What?”
“You don’t have to stop crying because somebody tells you they’ll be nicer if you do. You don’t have to earn your crutch. You don’t have to earn dinner. You don’t have to earn a door opening.”
Sophie’s mouth trembled.
Claire stopped herself.
She was doing exactly what she hated when adults spoke at frightened children as though one perfect speech could repair everything.
So she sat back on her heels.
“Also,” she said, softer, “I’m sorry I brought you on this stupid boat.”
Sophie sniffed.
“I like the boat.”
Claire stared at her.
“The boat?”
“The ice is good.”
Reyes looked down to hide something that might have been a smile.
Sophie wiped her nose with her sleeve.
Claire pulled a tissue from her evening bag.
“You have pockets,” Sophie said.
“It’s a handbag.”
“It has a pocket.”
“This is not the time.”
“You always say dresses should have pockets.”
“They should.”
“That dress doesn’t.”
“I have been betrayed by formalwear.”
Sophie took the tissue.
For five seconds they were themselves again.
Then Reyes’s radio crackled.
A voice said Owen Mercer had been found.
Not overboard.
In the communications office.
He had been trying to delete files.
Reyes closed his eyes briefly.
“Of course he was.”
Claire rose.
“What files?”
“We’ll find out.”
“Can we go home?”
Sophie asked it without drama.
That cut deeper than anything else had.
Reyes looked at Claire.
“The ship cannot put you ashore tonight.”
“When?”
“We’re scheduled to reach port tomorrow afternoon. The captain may alter that depending on what we establish.”
Claire glanced toward the open room.
She did not want Sophie sleeping on the same vessel as Victoria.
“Can you keep Victoria away from us?”
“Yes.”
“You sound very sure.”
“I am.”
Claire studied him.
He understood why.
“She doesn’t command this ship,” he said.
“People have been saying versions of that about other things my entire adult life.”
“I can only speak for the ship.”
That was the first answer anyone had given Claire all night that did not pretend to be larger than it was.
She believed him.
They were moved to another cabin on Deck Five.
A crew member brought Sophie’s remaining belongings after security checked them. Claire changed out of the satin dress and stood for a long time in a white bathrobe, staring at the pale blue fabric crumpled across a chair.
Her palm had stopped stinging.
Her shame had not.
She had hit Victoria.
That fact existed separately from everything Victoria had done.
Claire did not regret stopping her hand.
She did regret the slap.
Both things could be true.
Sophie sat cross-legged on the bed with Fox tucked beneath one arm and her crutch leaning against the mattress.
“Are you in trouble?”
Claire turned.
“Probably.”
Sophie’s eyes widened.
Claire sat beside her.
“I’m not going to lie to you. I hit someone. There were witnesses. There may be consequences.”
“But she grabbed me.”
“I know.”
“So why would you be in trouble?”
“Because adults make rules about hitting people for pretty good reasons.”
Sophie considered this.
“What if the other person is terrible?”
“Still complicated.”
“What if they’re really terrible?”
“Annoyingly, still complicated.”
Sophie picked at a loose thread on Fox’s tail.
“You told me I shouldn’t hit Maddie when she pushed me.”
“I did.”
“You hit Grandma Victoria.”
“I did.”
“That’s hypocrisy.”
Claire stared at her.
“Where did you learn that word?”
“Dad.”
The room went quiet.
Sophie rarely said Dad without warning.
Claire rubbed a thumb along the robe belt.
“That does sound like your dad.”
“He said grown-ups are hypocrites with credit cards.”
Claire laughed before she could stop herself.
Sophie did too.
Then the laugh caught in the child’s throat.
“I miss him.”
“I know.”
Claire looked toward the dark window.
Their new cabin had only a small porthole. Outside was a piece of black ocean and, occasionally, a wash of white spray.
“I miss him too.”
“You don’t talk about him much.”
The accusation was mild.
That made it worse.
Claire folded the end of the robe belt over itself.
“Sometimes I don’t because I think talking about him will make you sad.”
“I’m already sad.”
“I know.”
“So that’s dumb.”
“Extremely.”
Sophie leaned against her.
Claire put an arm around her carefully.
After a minute Sophie said, “Grandma said Dad wanted me to be tougher.”
Claire closed her eyes.
“When?”
“A lot.”
“What did she say he told her?”
“That he worried I was too sensitive.”
“That doesn’t sound like him.”
“She said you’d say that because you were jealous.”
Claire looked down.
“Of Victoria?”
“No. Mom.”
That surprised her enough that she did not answer.
Sophie continued.
“She said you were jealous Dad married Mom.”
Claire almost laughed again, but Sophie was watching her.
The truth was less simple than denial.
May you like
Claire had been jealous.
Not romantically. Nothing grotesque. She had been twenty-seven when Ethan married Nora Hale, and her brother had gone from calling Claire three nights a week to forgetting her birthday for the first time in his life. Nora was funny, beautiful, well connected and maddeningly organized. Claire had resented how easily Nora fit into Ethan’s future.
